Hello and welcome to the details of Trump halts Colombia aid over drug row as US strikes rebel-linked boat, tensions with Petro escalate and now with the details
Nevin Al Sukari - Sana'a - This combination of pictures created on January 26, 2025 shows US President Donald Trump in Pacific Palisades, a neighborhood of Los Angeles, California, on January 24, 2025 and Colombian President Gustavo Petro in Cali, Colombia, on September 9, 2023. Trump said yesterday the United States is halting financial aid to Colombia, a longstanding US ally, as he accused its president of condoning the production of drugs. — AFP pic
WASHINGTON, Oct 20 — The United States announced yesterday another strike against what it called a drug-running boat, this time attacking an alleged Colombian leftist rebel vessel in an apparent expansion of a US military operation off the coasts of South America.
Word of the attack from Pentagon chief Pete Hegseth came as President Donald Trump said the United States is halting financial aid to Colombia, accusing its president of condoning the production of drugs. This took embattled relations between two longstanding allies to a new low.
The United States has had warships deployed in the Caribbean off Venezuela since August and has attacked at least six boats it said were running drugs toward the United States, killing at least 27 people so far.
Experts question the legality of attacking such boats in international waters without trying to intercept them or arrest the crew members and bring them to trial.
The flotilla has created acute tension with Venezuela amid fears the ultimate goal of the operation might be to oust leftist President Nicolas Maduro, who Washington says leads a drug cartel.
In a strike carried out Friday, Hegseth said US forces attacked a vessel he said was affiliated with Colombia’s National Liberation Army, a leftist guerrilla group known as ELN in Spanish. Three crew members were killed, he said.
Hegseth said the vessel was traveling in international waters in an area under the purview of the US Southern Command, which oversees US military operations in Latin America. He did not specify where. Colombia has both Caribbean and Pacific coasts.
Trump has clashed repeatedly of late with President Gustavo Petro, a former guerrilla leader who has been highly critical of the US naval deployment.
As recently as Saturday, Petro accused the United States of murder in the death of a Colombian fisherman killed in a US strike in September.
The harsh verbal exchanges have taken relations between two historic allies to their lowest point in decades. Until now, Colombia has received more US aid than any other country in South America — US$740 million (RM3.1 billion) in 2023, according to US government figures. Half of this went to fighting drug trafficking.
Yesterday, Trump lashed out at Petro, saying he was doing nothing to stop cocaine production despite “large scale payments and subsidies from the USA.”
“AS OF TODAY, THESE PAYMENTS, OR ANY OTHER FORM OF PAYMENT, OR SUBSIDIES, WILL NO LONGER BE MADE” to Colombia, Trump said on his Truth Social platform, adding that Petro is “strongly encouraging the massive production of drugs.”
In the post, Trump repeatedly misspelled the name of the country as “Columbia.”
He called Petro “an illegal drug leader strongly encouraging the massive production of drugs, in big and small fields, all over Columbia.”
Petro responded angrily to Trump in a series of posts on X.
“Colombia has never been rude to the United States. To the contrary, it has loved its culture very much. But you are rude and ignorant about Colombia,” Petro wrote.
Last month, Washington announced it had decertified Colombia as an ally in the fight against drugs.
Colombia hit back by halting arms purchases from the United States, its biggest military partner.
The United States last month revoked Petro’s US visa after he spoke at a pro-Palestinian rally in New York on the sidelines of the UN General Assembly.
In his post yesterday, Trump also appeared to hint at some kind of US intervention in Colombia, although he did not elaborate.
“Petro, a low rated and very unpopular leader, with a fresh mouth toward America, better close up these killing fields immediately, or the United States will close them up for him, and it won’t be done nicely,” Trump wrote.
Since coming to power in 2022, Petro has championed a paradigm shift in the US-led war on drugs, away from forced eradication to focus on the social problems that fuel drug trafficking.
Under his watch, cultivation of coca, the raw material of cocaine, has increased by about 70 per cent, according to Colombian government and United Nations estimates. — AFP
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